1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a technology for identifying a fault based on a causal relation between a fault occurring on a network and an event indicating a sign of the fault.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, networks are widely being used for exchanging and sharing information in various fields, and are becoming increasingly important. Therefore, it is extremely important to find out a fault as early as possible by always monitoring networks and preventing development of the fault to the vital state of the network.
Generally, automatic monitoring tools are used for network monitoring. The automatic monitoring tool collects events reported by a network device upon occurrence of a fault, analyses the events to identify the fault, and notifies a network administrator of the occurrence of the fault.
As an example of such automatic monitoring tools, U.S. Pat. No. 5,528,516 discloses a technology for previously determining, as a pattern, a causal relation between a fault occurring on a network and an event occurring with the fault, and comparing the pattern with a pattern acquired when the fault occurs, thereby efficiently identify a primary cause of the fault.
However, there are an enormous number of events reported from a network device when a fault occurs, and the increase in the traffic causes an increase in load on the network.